Monday, July 4, 2016

catching a ballgame + 1997 Bowman hobby box

The Portland Pickles are a new collegiate woodbat baseball team, doing their best to fill the void in town since the AAA Portland Beavers moved away a few years ago. My wife and I hopped on the train yesterday afternoon and caught our first game of theirs.

We found a decent spot on the grass down the left field line. The home team got off to a rough start with the visiting Lodi Crushers scoring 3 in the 1st thanks to some sloppy defense, but the Pickles came back to tie it up, eventually taking the lead.

It was a pretty big turnout. In fact, I think it was a sellout and set their attendance record. A great day for baseball.

Selfie time!

Guy warming up in the bullpen.

It was my first live baseball game since catching a Hillsboro Hops game last year.

We ended up taking off in the 8th inning because we wanted to catch the train home (and it was that or wait a long time for the next one), plus neither of us brought a jacket and it was getting a little chilly by that point. The Pickles held on to win (link to recap), so that's nice.

I had printed up a few generic cards for autographs, but we didn't arrive early enough or stay late enough to score any signatures. Maybe next time.

So yeah, that was a fun evening at the ballpark. Would definitely go back again.

Switching gears... Here's another box I picked up cheap a couple months ago to have something around to rip on days I otherwise didn't get any new cards. Took me a while, but I finally got through it. Time for the highlights..

My Frank Thomas PC saw some additions thanks to the box. The American flags here help me meet the minimum requirements for a proper 4th of July blogpost. Happy Birthday, USA!

Some more inserts, with a Konerko and a couple Astros. These are available for trade, if anyone's interested.

Some base veteran cards of dudes I collect. Canseco looks kinda strange in his A's double-dip.

Here's a nice selection of "First Bowman Card" prospects. Forgot to include Halladay and Sean Casey in the photo. I think that's my first pack-pulled card of Guy From Granite John Barnes.. kinda cool, even if I did already pick it up from Just Commons a while back.

And a couple other prospect cards of guys I collect, Derrek Lee (from his brief Padres tenure) and Vladimir Guerrero. There were slight odds at pulling a Vlad auto from the box, though I wasn't so lucky. That guy was a beast in his prime.

6 comments:

This might sound crazy... but I actually think minor league games are more entertaining than MLB games. Love all of the in-between innings entertainment... and although I can't speak for the rest of the country... the BBQ at San Jose Giants games beats anything I've tried at SF Giants or Oakland A's games.

Seeing Paul Konerko as a Dodger is kind of a mind-twister. We have a minor-league team here locally. I've been meaning to attend a game, but it's one of those things that I just never get around to doing.

Minor league games are great, especially if you are familiar with most of the players (which I usually am if I try to get autographs), and that '97 Bowman set brings back memories of me as a 14-year old who didn't have much money to spend and would've loved pulling a Jose Cruz, Jr., Travis Lee, or Kerry Wood card from a pack. I still haven't busted a '97 Bowman pack, but have got the '97 Bowman Chrome Lee and '97 Bowman International Wood for less than a buck on COMC.

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